OCCRP REPORTING

🇸🇧 Solomon Islands: China gave a local paper $140,000 to “promote the truth about China’s generosity and its true intentions” towards the Pacific country, a leaked document and interviews reveal. (Read about our story in the Guardian).

🇰🇭 Cambodia: Two of the main figures behind a controversial Special Economic Zone in Cambodia have business ties to Chinese gambling tycoon She Zhijiang, who is fighting extradition from Thailand to China.

THE OCCRP NETWORK

🇭🇺 Atlatszo: Our Hungarian member center reports that several hospitals are placing patients who need surgery on secret waiting lists instead of official ones. This alternative system, critics say, lets hospitals report shorter waiting times — at least on paper.

🌍 ARIJ: Our MENA partner — working with  the Google News Initiative — has developed a framework for Arabic-speaking newsrooms on how to use artificial intelligence in journalism.

🇦🇹 DOSSIER: Our Austrian member center reports on a Vienna-based company that allegedly used questionable data and calculations to certify buildings as more sustainable and climate-resilient than they actually are. 

🇱🇰 Watchdog: Our Sri Lankan partner details the dangerous journey of a man who boarded a rickety boat with the hope of eventually reaching Canada. An increasing number of Sri Lankans are taking risks like this one to escape the country’s acute economic crisis. 

FOLLOW THE MONEY NEWS

🇺🇸 United States: A bipartisan group of senators reintroduced legislation that would place greater anti-money laundering requirements on the cryptocurrency industry, including stricter ‘Know Your Customer’ rules for crypto miners and digital wallet providers like Coinbase.

🇺🇸 United States: USAA Federal Savings Bank was fined $140 million for failing to file more than 3,000 “suspicious activity reports” to the Financial Crimes Enforcement Network, a violation of the Bank Secrecy Act.

• Not familiar with Suspicious Activity Reports? Read our FAQ about these secret documents, which underpinned the FinCEN Files project. 

🇮🇳 India: A Delhi court ruled that PayPal’s local subsidiary must adhere to anti-money laundering measures similar to what many banks are required to follow, including maintaining records of all transactions and verifying the identities of clients.

CORRUPTION NEWS

🇲🇽 Mexico: A group of lawyers have proposed letting citizens collaborate in corruption-related cases, including presenting evidence in court and disputing the decisions of prosecutors. The lawyers believe that the public will be more invested in the fight against corruption if they have an active role in it.

🇨🇳 China: The Financial Times reports on Xi Jinping’s anti-corruption crusade in the country’s armed forces, after dozens of senior military and political cadres were arrested in recent months.

🇵🇹 Portugal: Prosecutors have requested that bail for the co-founder of telecommunications firm Altice be set at 10 million euros, the highest in Portuguese history. The former executive has been under house arrest since late July for his alleged involvement in procurement fraud. 

GLOBAL CRIME NEWS

🇪🇸 Spain: A fake arms dealer who scammed millions of dollars from clients via bogus weapons contracts has been arrested again on fraud charges. In 2018, OCCRP exposed Pierre Konrad Dadak's life as a globe-trotting con man. This new batch of charges indicate that he may be back to old tricks. 

🇩🇪 Germany: The European Union Prosecutor’s Office has indicted eight suspects in connection with an alleged 80-million-euro VAT fraud scheme, involving luxury cars and medical face masks.

🇨🇦 Canada: The National Post reports on how splinters within Montreal organized crime groups have resulted in an upsurge in public violence, including assassinations. 

ONLINE JOURNALISM AWARDS 2023

1. Story Killers: OCCRP was a partner in this Forbidden Stories project that exposed the inner workings of disinformation mercenaries. It has been nominated for an Online Journalism Award in Excellence in Collaboration and Partnerships.
2. The Banality of Brutality: OCCRP and Slidstvo.Info, our Ukrainian member center, detailed what it was like to survive the Russian invasion of Bucha. It has been nominated for an Online Journalism Award in Excellence and Innovation in Visual Digital Storytelling category.